That Dreadful Night
by GoddessofSnark
Summary: Implied slash. Scrooge reflects on Marley as the Spirit of Christmas Past shows him Fezziwig's party.


Disclaimer: Don't own em, But I think at this point they may be common property. Dunno.they are originally Dickens' though.  
  
A/N: Woo! Lot's of angst! And some implied slash, nothing really obvious. It's something of a hint as to why Scrooge hates Christmas so much. Just some of his thoughts as he watches the party at Fezziwig's.  
  
You were so beautiful. You always were so beautiful, you were one of the most beautiful people in the world. I want to curse, to throttle this dreadful spirit for showing you to me again. Showing me how you looked so long ago, back when we were both young, when we were both so vibrant, so full of life before he became the miserable misers that we were destined to turn into. You looked so wonderful, so handsome back then. Even on the night you died you still looked so wonderful.  
  
You were always my inspiration. Everything I've ever done I've done for you, because of you. I went into business because it's what you did. I taught myself how to succeed in business because you were so naturally good at it. I followed you in everything that you did, eventually becoming your closest friend. I was heartbroken when Belle left me that dreadful night, but the night that you left me, my heart wasn't the only thing that broke. On the night that you left my, my soul shattered as well.  
  
Why did you leave me? Why did you have to go right when I needed you the most? I still need you. I still need you with me, here beside me. I need someone to trade sarcastic quips with. Someone to make my business, nay, our business still seem a worthwhile cause. I need you to come back to me, to hold me, to tell me that everything's going to be alright. That we were the rich, the best in this world of poor. I need you to come back and love me the way that I love you.  
  
You left me when I needed you most. You left me on Christmas Eve, a day I never liked, but now truly despise. I never cared much for the holiday after Belle left me on that one day. But when you left me on that day as well, I collapsed inside. I cannot stand the site of a Christmas tree, I can't stand to hear the words Merry Christmas. Now I can't stand the holiday, now there are just too many bad memories related to the holiday.  
  
When you died, it shattered not only my heart but my soul as well. The last shred of compassion, the last tiniest bit of love that this blackened, icy heart could feel died along with you that dreary night seven years hence. The last bits of feeling that I had drifted off with you. you were the last person I loved, the last reason why I even needed those feelings, and when you died, everything I've ever felt before, anything I ever needed to feel died with you.  
  
When you came to me tonight, I wanted nothing more than to draw you near and never let you go. I wanted to hold you as tight as I could and hold you there for all eternity. I wanted to wrap you in my arms and tell you all the things I should have told you when you were still here to listen to them, when you were still here to respond, but I was too afraid to. But when you appeared, I wanted to tell you that I loved you, but you never gave me the chance to.  
  
When you came to me tonight, in chains like you did, I wanted nothing more than to unlock you and unbind you. I wanted to rescue you from your living hell. I wanted to loosen the chains that held you so tightly and replace them with my arms. I wanted to save you from the torture that was inflicted on you, I wanted to redeem you myself. I wanted to undo your chains and hold you in my arms the way that I held you on that night that is still so fresh in my memory. I wanted you to never leave me again.  
  
That night still haunts me. There are still some times when I lay my head down on my pillow and you enter into my dreams. I can't count the number of nights that you creep into my dreams, I can't count the number of times that you slip away in them just as easily. I can't count the number of nights where I wake up sobbing for you, because in my dream I was sobbing over you. The number of nights where you go limp in my arms are far to many than I would like to admit.  
  
I should have sent you home that day, no matter how much you protested. But I didn't. I should have kept trying to get you to go rest, but you would incessantly tell me that it was nothing, that it was only a cough. It was Christmas Eve, we should have both been leaving early, but no, we had become miserable old bachelors, the both of us. You were so sick. I even did something I never did and put some coal in the stove to warm the place up a bit. I would do anything to make you feel better.  
  
You spent the entire day coughing, that's how sick you were. And you were so pale and feverish. But you insisted on working. How ironic that you always said that you would work until you dying day, and you did. No matter how sick you were you refused to go home until the end of the working day, you were always so diligent. That's where I got it from, I got it from you. I never leave until all the work is done, and I never leave before the working day is over.  
  
You were so sick, so weak when we left that I had to help you home, you could barely even walk. I went up to your bedroom with you, and even cooked you something, and made you tea. You had given your housekeeper the day off with much protest on your behalf, and had no one to do that for you. No matter how much you complained that you could do it, I think even you knew that you were too weak to. You hardly ate anything, and only had a little of the tea. You looked so small, so helpless.  
  
I held you close and took good care of you. I remember all to well what it's like to lose someone to a fever. I put cold cloths on your head trying to soothe you. You told me how I didn't have to, you told me I was a saint for doing everything I was. You told me I was the only person in the world you could trust, that I was your closest friend, the way that you were my closest friend. I held you and told you how much I loved you. And you echoed my sentiments.  
  
I kissed your hot feverish brow, and your dry cracked lips found mine. We were not two miserable old lonely men anymore, we had each other, and that was enough. We were all that the other needed. You filled the void in my heart that I had ever since Belle left me, you were always the one to fill it. In that one moment, we were one, we were no longer the greedy old men that we were, but we were young again, you were the man that this spirit tortures me with.  
  
You were the young man at Fezziwig's old party, the one who I had to pay to dance with their daughter. You were the young man with the scathing sarcasm that I first fell in love with. You were the young man before either of us became obsessed with money. You always were greedy, but this was when your heart and your soul, and mine as well, were not obscured with shillings. You were still kind to most back then, not only to me. And I still had my dream of owning a house, something of my very own.  
  
I held you so tightly that night, afraid to let you go. Because I knew that if I loosened my grip around you, that you would slide off into the great beyond. I wasn't ready to lose you yet. I never would be ready to lose you. but especially not then. I didn't want to let you leave me. I knew that if I released you, that you would release your hold on life, the last little grip on it that you had. And I still can't bear life without you here. So we clung to each other that night.  
  
We were all that the other one had. You were my entire life, and I was yours. We had each other, and our work. Our lives revolved around our work, even back then. And I was there to ease your coughing, soothe your feverish brow. I was there to hold you tight and tell you that you couldn't die. And you were always there for me. You were always my inspiration, for as long as I can remember. You were the only boy at the school who didn't look down on me because I was once poor.  
  
I was there to hold you when you breathing became more and more ragged. I was there to try and soothe you as you coughed harder and harder, bringing blood up with it. I was there to be the one that you rested against as you fought so hard to breathe. You were so small, so weak, so pale that night, as you lay against me, soaking my shirt through. That night I learned how to feel again, I learned what love was again, and you did too, but that all faded away as you fell limp in my arms. I stopped feeling anything when you breathed your last heaving breath.  
  
My heart shattered right then and there. When you gave up and fell limp in my arms, when you gave up fighting any longer, and collapsed. When you lost all will, I cried for the first time in years. I cried for the first time since I lost Fan. I cried that night, for the first time in fifteen years. All the emotions I fought so hard not to feel burst out. I lost the only one I had ever loved, and I lost them on the night that I finally realized I loved them. I loved you and I cried when you were gone.  
  
You looked so peaceful as I let you slide from my arms. You looked like an angel as I laid you back so gently on your bed. I kissed you perfect lips, salty from the sweat, and already starting to grow cold as I pulled the sheet up over you. you were so peaceful so perfect in death, so beautiful, just as you were in life. You always will be the most beautiful person in the world, but as you lay there so still and unmoving that night, you were so stunning.  
  
I spent that whole night crying at your beside. And all of the next day as well. I spent my Christmas crying over the one who I love, the one who I lost. I spent my Christmas that year crying over you. I still spend many a Christmas with tearful memories of that fateful, fatal night. I spent the whole day sobbing over you, letting my tears soak your sheets, grasping that cold limp hand of yours as if some how, some way I could bring you back to life.  
  
And still, every Christmas, I find myself crying for you, I find myself stumbling to your grave at least once in the dead of night, as if someone, anyone, especially my heading there could bring you back to life. Every Christmas, I still go and sob over your grave, I still head to the cemetery, it's quite a peaceful place, and cry, as if my tears could bring you back. Because you were the only thing that ever meant anything to me. You were my only friend in the world.  
  
And now I feel so empty without you, I feel a void in my life that I haven't felt since I lost my dear Fan, a void that I haven't felt since Belle left me, but you filled those voids, now that I no longer have you here living beside me, I feel so empty. You were everything I had in this world. You don't know what it was like when I saw you again today, I loved every moment of being with you again, I loved having you beside me again, but I hated it because you teased me, you were only there for a fleeting minute.  
  
When I saw you dancing, I felt my heart flutter in a way it never beat before. I felt love again, I knew what it was like to feel once more. But now you're gone and I'm lost without you. you had to leave me when I needed you most. I loved you so much that it hurts to know that I have to live my life without you. you were all I ever had, you were all I ever needed. When I lost you on that dreadful night, I not only lost the man that I loved, but I lost my heart, I lost my soul. They died with you. I loved you so much I can't stand living without you.  
  
I remember what it's like to actually feel things again. I remember what it was to love. I loved you Jacob Marley, and I hate this spirit for showing you to me, in all your youthful beauty. You were so handsome back then, you still are the most beautiful person. Now just as I start to forget the pain of that dreadful night, you come back and haunt me again. I loved you so much, come back to me, I need you too much to lose you again. 


End file.
